Zambian Minister of National Guidance and Religious Affairs Rev. Godfridah Sumaili this week announced that their government is working with church mother bodies to come up with a legal framework to introduce minimum qualifications for pastors to help reduce cases of misconduct by the clergy.
The Minister told the Parliament that it is important for pastors who provide spiritual guidance to people to possess qualification.
Rev, Sumaili said this during questions for oral answer session in response to after one Hon. Kelvin Sampa inquired what measures the government is undertaking to improve the moral standing of church leaders following negative reports in some sections of the media about their alleged misconduct.
“We are putting up a legal framework where we are going to have minimum qualifications for one to provide services of a pastor,” Reverend Sumaili said.
The minister said the framework, once established, will guide the conduct of the clergy in the country. Rev Sumaili said the desire of her ministry is to see behaviour change among clergymen who have been cited for misconduct.
“We are not just there to condemn but we also want to see them [clergy] change and strengthen their leadership role in the church,” she said.
Rev. Sumaili said she is in receipt of several reports of misconduct by some clergy, among them sexual abuse of young girls and theft from vulnerable members who seek spiritual guidance.
“Some reports are allegations while some have been found to be true and so steps have been taken to counsel those found wanting to strengthen their character,” she said.
She urged all churches to affiliate with religious bodies to be accountable in their activities. The minister said the ministry is also holding talks with traditional leaders and the Church on the dress code in churches and outside.
The minister’s words, however, did not sit well with her fellow clerics.
One standout man of the cloth who did not take the proposed government framework well was Bishop Mubanga Mumbi from the Church of God (Zambia), a denomination under the Church of God, Cleveland Tennessee, USA.
In response to the minister’s announcement, Bishop wrote a long piece titled, “Theological, historical, political and ethical reasons why Govt shouldn’t regulate the church.”
We Publish The Response Below:
The Church is divided between those who favour a government regulated Church and those who do not. The majority do not favour a government regulated Church as the series of articles in The Church Newspaper suggests.
However there are theological, historical, political and ethical reasons for not supporting state regulation of the Church.
Theological reasons against a government-regulated Church include the following among many others;
- Governments have no God-given mandate to regulate or take over the Church or its functions (2 Chronicles 26:16-21 ESV). Godly government leaders can encourage church leaders to revive their work, remove foreign idolatrous worship (2 Chronicles 34:33) but they are not ordained to train and select clergy.
- Government’s primary task is justice (holding the sword, Romans 13:4), while the Church’s primary role is compassion (sharing the love of God, being salt and light, Jude 1:21; 1 John 3:10; Matthew 5:13-14, ESV)
- Caesar has things apportioned to him by God and there are things that do not belong to Caesar (Matthew 22:21). Caesar, or government acting on God’s behalf, has certain claims on the citizens. However, God has direct claim over every soul. When Caesar’s claims violate God’s claims, God-loving citizens have a duty to choose to honor God’s claims above those of governments (Acts 5:29).
Historical reasons against state regulation of the Church;
- European states favoring state regulated churches have killed the true European churches by state regulation. They employ and pay ministers of their national churches who cannot preach the whole Bible because some parts of the Bible are considered “hate speech” and heavily prosecuted.
- In 1650, it was the Anglican Bishops who forced the King of England to sign the Magna Carta (the ancestor to the bill of human rights) because as leader of the England’s Church and King, his powers were exceedingly unbearable for the average citizen. The house of Lords has hundreds of secular lords and 26 Ecclesiastical lords whose effect on the welfare of the Church under the English government has been to slow down the Church’s spirituality and augment social activity.
The UK is becoming less and less of a Christian nation, not because Muslims have increased their numbers in the U.K., but because the Christians have no clear message for these new immigrants with a clear-cut religion. The voice of 26 ecclesiastical lords inside the U.K. government today counts for nothing in comparison to the voice of one Martin Luther, outside government (he supported the government of his day without being one of them).
- When government takes over the Church, the greatest persecution of the prophetic voice of the Church comes from the prophets at the king’s table. By prophetic voice I do not mean these performers giving the Church a bad name by swindling the congregation, I mean men and women speaking the truth that can bring a resetting of the nation onto a godly developmental trajectory; a voice that calls for the kind of national reformation that changes the way a nation thinks, views, and take their place in God’s world.
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